


Teen Wolf, Season 1, Episode 2, Second Chance at First Line

by TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Analysis, Episode Review, Episode: s01e02 Second Chance At First Line, Meta, Nonfiction, Season/Series 01, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2019-07-14 07:51:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16036151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer/pseuds/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer
Summary: Warning: Contains spoilers for both the episode and the rest of the series. Complete.





	Teen Wolf, Season 1, Episode 2, Second Chance at First Line

Open to Scott being mopey in the locker room. He tells Stiles about Allison’s dad being one of the hunters who attacked him in the woods.

Why do these idiot boys think talking about this in a public place with other people around is a good idea?

Trust me, I fully acknowledge I was an idiot as a teenager, but most of my idiocy wasn’t the type found in TV!teenagers. For one thing, I almost never talked about anything deeply personal around non-friend classmates, and sure, I’d probably already be dead or captured if I were supernatural, but it likely wouldn’t be due to me blabbing about my supernatural status in public.

Scott almost has a full-on panic attack, but Stiles gets him to simply focus on lacrosse for the moment.

On the field, Coach is yelling at the possibly imaginary Greenberg. Heh.

There’s a theory Greenberg might be a girl, and reading this made me realise I honestly don’t know if anyone in the show has ever used pronouns when talking about/addressing Greenberg.

Scott’s knocked down by Jackson, and yellow eyes appear as Coach is yelling at him. He tries again, and this time, he knocks Jackson down.

Noticing Scott’s wolfing out, Stiles gets him off the field, and there’s a shot of creeper Derek lurking.

In the locker room, Scott goes full-out feral. He tries attacking Stiles, and grabbing the fire extinguisher, Stiles sprays him.

Once Scott is calm, however, he immediately drops it. He says Scott is going to have forgo playing the game on Saturday, and when Scott brings up being on first line, Stiles declares he’s not anymore.

Later, at the McCall house, Melissa is in scrubs. I’m sure they’ll be different the next time she’s wearing them. She’s pulling a late shift, but she says she’s taking Saturday off to see his game.

He protests, but she insists. She expresses concern about him looking sleep-deprived, and there’s a cute/funny exchange about whether either of them have ever done drugs. It ends with neither getting an answer.

Next, he and Stiles video-chat over the computer. It’s revealed Jackson has a seperated shoulder, and Scott expresses guilt. “Because of me?”

“Because, he’s a tool,” Stiles answers.

Sure, Scott could have been a little more careful, but I do believe it was an accident, and since I loathe Jackson: No argument here.

There’s a creepy moment with the computer glitching, Stiles making a creepy face, trying to type out a message, and then, the computer freezes.

It turns out Derek has broken into Scott’s room.

Manhandling Scott, Derek goes on about Scott shifting in front of everyone.

Assuming this all went down this way: Yes, and where were you when he was about to kill Stiles?

Going further, I understand certain memories might be genuinely traumatic for Derek, but the basic knowledge he was once an out-of-control beta should be there. Peter actually handled helping him relatively well. How does he think he would have felt if Peter had done anything like this instead?

Derek continues, if Scott tries to play on Saturday, Derek will kill him.

I don’t know how Derek was with his siblings. Threats of killing between family members can be a harmless thing. I do think, up until 212, Derek did genuinely want to protect Scott and help him.

However, if this is unreliable narration, Scott is doing a good job of painting Derek as unsympathetic.

From Scott’s POV: This monster bit him, made him a target of the dad of the girl he likes, broke into his room, and then, threatened to kill him if he can’t control the abilities he only has due to the monster biting him.

I wouldn’t like, trust, or even listen to Derek, either.

I would listen if someone I did care about made the same admittedly reasonable arguments Derek will make later on, but Derek alone? Nope. I’d probably swat away any stray of thought of, ‘Y’know, this does actually sound reasonable,’ with, ‘He’s a violent, aggressive monster. I should do the opposite of listening to him.’

The next day, Scott tries to back out of the game, and Coach treats this like Scott is going through some puberty/sexuality crisis. Danny and Danny’s gayness is brought up, and Scott establishes himself as straight.

Coach refuses to let him back out with the threat of taking him off first line if he does. Leaving the office, Scott gets a text from Melissa about how excited she is for the game.

Allison appears, and she tells him she’s coming to see him play, too. The fact they’re also going out with Lydia and Jackson afterwards is brought up, and this is something she should have asked, not informed him of.

Telling him to bring Stiles, she bounces.

Allison’s awesome, and she does get credit for trying to include Scott’s best friend, but this was incredibly rude of her.

At her locker, she finds her jacket from the party, and there’s creepy wolf vision watching her. When it comes to the jacket, I think Derek probably returned it, but when it comes to the wolf vision, I can’t say for sure it’s Peter, but it’d make more sense than either Scott or Derek.

Elsewhere, in a class, Scott and Lydia are both doing something on a board, and Lydia’s the annoying Queen Bee I loathe watching. To wit: She wants him to play, and she’ll be even more annoying if he doesn’t.

Later, Stiles uses Scott to eavesdrop on the sheriff and what I’m guessing isa school official. There’s a curfew for all teenagers.

Believing Derek is the killer, Stiles is angry Derek is still free. He decides he’s going to find the other half of the body.

Scott notices Lydia introducing Allison to another boy. At first, I thought it was Matt, but it wasn’t. Lydia and the other boy leave, and Scott makes clear his suspicion of Lydia’s motives. Allison, however, defends her new friend.

Good for her, but Scott’s right.

He notices her jacket, and she thinks Lydia was the one who brought it back from the party. It’s revealed Lydia knows her combination, and for all I don’t like this incarnation of Lydia’s character, that’s a genuinely sweet tidbit about their friendship.

Scott weirds her out by interrogating her about the jacket, and then, he makes her even more uneasy by declaring Derek isn’t his friend. When he starts asking about what she said during the car ride, she excuses herself.

Going to the Hale house, he spots some disturbed dirt before yelling at Derek. Appearing, Derek ruins Scott’s crosse. He insists he’s looking out for Scott, and he makes some reasonable arguments on why Scott shouldn’t play.

Though, again, refer to why Scott might have understandable reasons at this point to disregard them.

The next scene has Scott and Stiles in Scott’s room. He explains about the dirt and smell of blood. They decide to prove Derek killed the girl and work on how Scott can play without shifting.

At the hospital, Scott goes to the morgue to see the half of Laura’s body they have in custody, and Stiles sees Lydia. His crush is on full display, and it’s as annoying as ever.

He tries to talk to her, and it’s revealed she’s listening to someone on a Bluetooth.

In the morgue, Scott looks at Laura, and the morgue really should have some security, especially if they’re going to be storing police evidence.

Meanwhile, Lydia and Jackson are annoying. She’s pushing him to be a great athlete at the risk of his health, and he’s his typical charmless self. I side more with him than her in this scene, but he chooses to put up with her and this relationship neither of them are actually happy in.

Appearing, Scott declares the scent from the morgue was the same from the makeshift grave.

Stiles asks if Scott is doing this because he wants to stop Derek or if it’s because Derek said not to play in the game.

I would have had no problem with the answer, ‘Both,’ but Scott lies about there being bite marks on the legs. No, there weren’t. The camera clearly showed there weren’t.

There are a lot of things about Scott I object to, but I don’t think he’s sociopath. I do think he has a general desire for bad people to be stopped. In this instance, it’s more about wanting to play the game than bringing a killer to justice, but like I said, this would be fine with me. He’s a sixteen-year-old kid. It’s normal for kids to be more worried about their own lives than the fact there are bad people out there.

What I do have a problem with is the lying to his best friend.

At night, someone drives off from the Hale house, and Stiles and Scott drive up.

I have suspicion the driver was Peter or someone involved with Peter.

Scott declares something is different, but he doesn’t know what. They dig, and Scott worries about if Derek shows back up. Stiles has a plan: They run different directions, and whoever he catches, too bad.

Of course, Stiles knows he’d likely be the one caught.

When they finally get to the body, it’s half of a wolf.

Noticing nearby some wolfs bane, Stiles discovers it was making Laura’s body appear as a wolf. During this, it’s also shown a spiral was made with it.

I’m not sure if it was Derek or Peter/some involved with Peter whoburied Laura, but I think the spiral of wolfs bane was Peter, not Derek.

In the morning (they didn’t call straight away?), Derek is arrested, and I’ve always thought Hoechlin did great with this scene of handcuffed Derek being placed in a squad car. It’s wordless but powerful.

Stiles appears, and Posey does great at Scott’s look when he realises Stiles is going for the squad car containing Derek.

There’s incredible chemistry between Hoechlin and O’Brien when Stiles hops into the passenger’s seat.

“Okay, just so you know, I’m not afraid of you.” At Derek’s look, he admits, “Okay, maybe I am. Doesn’t matter.”

He brings up the girl Derek killed being a different type of werewolf due to her being able to turn into an actual wolf and Scott not. “Is that why you killed her?”

“Why are you so worried about me when it’s your friend that’s the problem?”

Oh, boy, will this line take on different meanings down the seasons.

Acknowledging he can’t stop Scott from playing, he tasks Stiles with the job.

Even after Scott and Stiles got him arrested, Derek is still genuinely trying to look out for Scott. I just wish he’d tried to handle things better before it got to this point. Does he even realise, if he tried to convince Stiles he’s not the killer and didn’t bite Scott, that it might help everything?

The sheriff drags Stiles out, and it’s made clear he doesn’t appreciate the lying, but he doesn’t really know how to handle his son.

Scott and Stiles leave, and Scott has a freakout in the car. They realise it’s the wolfs bane, and stopping Roscoe, Stiles throws his whole backpack away instead of just the wolfs bane.

However, Scott’s run off.

Next, Stiles is talking to dispatch.

One thing I’m always going to be salty about is Deputy Tara Graeme. She should have been a background character in the show for the first two seasons. Even making her a ghost character until the third season would have worked.

Here was one of the perfect opportunities to introduce her. Have the voice on the phone be addressed as her, and have the little characterisation that can be gleaned match how she is in season three. She could have been the one Derek flirted with, though, the characterisation might have had to be tweaked. Have the sheriff or Stiles mention her in some conversation.

The next scene has Scott creeping around on Allison’s roof. She closes her curtains, and disturbed by his werewolf reflection, he leaves only to be hit by Chris’s car.

This is when Chris first became suspicious of him.

To Chris’s credit, though, he does show an appropriate amount of concern and horror at what he just did, and if Scott had used the legitimate excuse of, ‘I was hit by a car,’ to avoid playing, everything might have remained okay for a little while longer.

Allison comes out, and her line, “Are you trying to kill him?,” and his answer of, “No, of course not,” is interesting based on some of what he later does against Scott.

Not noticing how Chris’s suspicions are growing, he insists he’s fine, confirms Allison is coming to watch him play in the lacrosse game that he’s totally up for playing despite just being hit by a car, and makes it obvious he and Allison are in puppy love.

Smooth going, Scott.

Now suitably suspicious and uneasy a potential werewolf is interested in his daughter, Chris announces, “We both are.”

JR Bourne does great in this scene. He has a talent for subtlety.

In the locker room, Scott’s senses act up. Stiles expresses his reservations but is still supportive.

At the beginning, I was sympathetic to Scott, but now, he could choose not to play. His best friend has made some good points on why he shouldn’t, and he’s been given two opportunities: Trauma over finding the body, or again, he was just hit by a car.

However, “I want to play!”

Outside, Lydia is annoying about Scott winning, again.

Coach and Jackson have a scene, and there’s some genuine concern for Jackson on his end, but also, he really wants the team to win.

The sheriff comes up to Stiles on the bench, and he asks about Stiles seeing any action tonight.

“Maybe,” Stiles grimly answers.

Jackson isn’t a team player, but because, he scores, this is ignored.

Allison and Lydia hold up a sign reading, We Luv U Jackson.

Ugh.

Admittedly, however, before the sign, it was a cute moment of two girlfriends cheering together and showing excitement.

Scott realises Jackson is using his position as captain to get the others to exclude Scott. I think Danny’s the one protesting this, but I have trouble identifying most of the male characters when they’re in full lacrosse uniform.

Then, Scott freaks the other players out with his stance.

In the stands, Chris asks which one is Scott, and irritated at Scott’s lack of ball catching, Lydia tells him. Allison hopes Scott is okay.

I wish he’d take this out. ‘Hey, being hit by the car must have affected me more than I realised, hopefully, I’ll be better by next game.’

Chris would still be suspicious, but Chris could also believe that a teenage boy trying to impress his teenage daughter would be reckless with his health and that the car didn’t severely hurt him but did causes issues a human being hit by a car would suffer.

Lydia insists on Allison helping her hold up a sign reading, Jackson is #1!!

This could be mirrorverse, but it could also be Lydia had more than one sign made. It wouldn’t be out-of-character for her.

All this causes Scott to show off on the field, and at one point, he shifts and terrifies a player on the other team.

Bad, Scott.

Almost everyone on home side is happy about them winning, and there’s a brief scene where Coach and Stiles talk about a player on the opposing team deliberately passing a ball to theirs. I’m not sure if Coach is dropping hints he knows or if he’s trying to give a subtle warning that Scott needs to tone it down some, but I do think it’s one of those two.

Scott becomes more wolf-like on the field, Stiles notices, and so do some of the opposing players.

At one point, an opposing player asks Jackson what’s up with Scott, and Jackson doesn’t know. “Yet.”

In the stands, Allison quietly says, “You can do it, Scott.”

He hears, and this helps him regain control enough to win.

Afterwards, though, he runs away, and Allison is left hurt and confused. Chris is even more suspicious. Stiles is distracted by his dad getting a call.

In the locker room, Allison has followed him, and he breaks a mirror. She finds the mirror, and up above, he lurks. Sensing something, she uneasily wanders around until she finds Scott in human form.

She doesn’t bring up the mirror. He claims to have gotten light-headed, and she suggests adrenaline rather than the fact he was hit by a car. She says he was amazing, he apologises for his weirdness earlier, and she says, “I can handle weird.”

They end up kissing, and Stiles witnesses this. She leaves, and Scott and Stiles discuss the kissing. Then, Stiles reveals Laura Hale, Derek’s sister, was the victim, and Derek has been let go due a medical examination concluding an animal killed her.

Out in the field, Jackson finds Scott’s werewolf-torn glove, and then, he notices Derek creeping around.

Derek leaves without incident, but really, work on your creeping, Derek.

Fin.


End file.
